


Human After All

by mycapeisplaid



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Bodily Functions, Crude Humor, M/M, Masturbation, Silly, Variations on a theme, each could stand alone, even sherlock farts, eventual romantic relationship, falling in love very slowly, wanking in the shower
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-08-14
Updated: 2016-06-15
Packaged: 2018-02-13 03:42:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 8,455
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2135757
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mycapeisplaid/pseuds/mycapeisplaid
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A series of stories about John discovering Sherlock really is a human being with a real human body that does real human things.  A bit of humor, a bit of feels, a bit of sex.  You know.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. He Digests

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is for Wearitcounts (Sherlockedup), who also has a fart story, and who promised me that I posted mine, she'd post hers. Hold her to it, folks. 
> 
> And yes, I went there. I'm so sorry. With all the stuff going down in our world today, maybe it's good just to take a step back and laugh at our own humanity in the face of how barbaric we humans can be.

Also, written in two days and only slightly beta'd and Britpicked, as Ms. Bettyswallocks is on vacation and this was my last day to write before I gear up for work. So any errors are my own.

 

Human After All: He Digests

John was anxious. He was supposed to work at the surgery the following morning, and the longer he sat in Greg Lestrade’s car, crawling up the M1 at a pace that would put a snail to shame, the more he realized that what Greg had insisted was a flying visit to Coventry for a consult was now likely to mean an overnight stay. He was also anxious because it was hot, and his body had betrayed him and forgotten how to deal with the heat in a proper manner. The air conditioning wasn’t quite cutting it, and he was forced to not only roll up his sleeves but also unbutton the first two buttons of his shirt. To make matters worse, his gut wasn’t behaving. Against his better judgement, he gobbled down a second sausage roll at Lestrade’s goading and drank Coke too quickly. Mr. I-Don’t-Eat-While-On-A-Case was in the back seat, lost in his mobile, immune to the heat, the slow traffic, and the discomforts of a rotten gut. 

Lestrade turned up Magic FM, the conversation having taken a turn toward nonexistent three exits ago. John stared ruefully at the cars to his left. A bored teen smacked chewing gum while she clandestinely checked her phone. The man in the car next to hers was picking his nose. And no one was going anywhere. 

Above the middle eight of _The Girl Is Mine_ , John heard the sound of a window going down.

And that’s when the madness began. 

There are times when grown men will regress to twelve-year-old boys. For instance, if boobs are involved: instant loss of maturity. Or if their favourite football team scores one in the final seconds, a victory dance that might resemble flailing or a seizure might simply be necessary. Even the most reserved of men can’t help but make a below-brow penis joke if there is one there for the making. Even fewer can restrain themselves in the face of flatulence, which is why, when Greg Lestrade, Detective Inspector, let one rip there in the car, there was nothing to do but, well, regress.

John’s finger found the button for the window, jamming it down as his good senses were assaulted. 

“Jesus Christ, Greg,” he laughed.

“Sorry, mate, was the sausage,” replied the DI, waving his hands a bit, which did nothing more than combine the odour with the heat and smell of exhaust. 

“God, that’s bloody awful.”

In the back, Sherlock rolled his eyes, not that anyone was paying attention to him.

Lestrade waited for the air to clear, then rolled his window back up. John did the same; the air conditioning was turned up and the managed to crawl another half mile up the road before John couldn’t help it.

“Payback,” he muttered, shifted a bit in his seat, and let one slide.

He and Lestrade looked at each other before reaching simultaneously for the window buttons. 

In the back, Sherlock rolled his eyes again, not that anyone was paying attention to him.

“God,” laughed Lestrade, “Just glad Sally’s not with us. You know what it’s like doing surveillance with her?”

“Why?” asked John, feeling significantly better, his discomfort alleviated both by the release of gaseous pressure and the boyish camaraderie. Sometimes he missed the easy, mindless way men came together, the way he and his mates would joke around after a rugby match at university, or later, while he was deployed, the way he and his fellow soldiers would find amusement in nothing worth any significance: practical jokes, stupid old movies, and, of course, bodily functions. 

“You just can’t fart in front of a woman, John. Least of all Sally. She’s…” he waved a hand in the air, looking for the right word. “...Classy. Can’t fart in front of a classy lady. Gentleman’s rules.”

John snorted. Sally Donovan sometimes made him want to throw bricks in her general direction. He did _not_ like the way she sneered at Sherlock. John granted that she was clever in her own right, but that did not give her the prerogative to belittle the man who’d done so much to help. Sherlock claimed it didn’t bother him, and maybe it didn’t. But John couldn’t simply be OK with someone who was constantly vituperative. 

“But you fart in front of your wife, yeah?”

Lestrade frowned. “Yeah. Did. Past tense. Divorce finally went through. But that’s different. I mean, when you live with someone, you can’t help it, right? Eventually you get to this comfortable place when it’s no use trying to blame the dog or pretend your shit doesn’t stink, you know? Plus. It’s just amusing sometimes. If God didn’t want us making such beautiful music, he shouldn’t have given us arsecheeks.”

John chuckled, and then, to punctuate it, let another one go. If his brain supplied an image of his flatmate’s backside clad in tight wool trousers at the mention of the word “arsecheeks”, no one was the wiser.

In the back, Sherlock rolled his eyes and heaved a sigh of great suffering, not that anyone was paying attention to him.

The managed another two miles in silence before the odourous symphony began again, and with it, the giggles. 

After one particularly raunchy bout of flatulence (at this point in time it was really rather unclear whose was whose, given the miasma now permeating the vehicle), Sherlock gave up on his phone. He muttered something about being surrounded by children.

“It’s not like you’ve never, Sherlock Holmes,” said Lestrade, who was taking the opportunity in a break in traffic to change lanes. 

“Actually,” said John, “I don’t think he does.” He thought about the way they’d fell into each other’s orbits of domesticity, although nothing was routine about living at Baker Street with London’s only consulting detective. Mad genius he was, couldn’t be counted on for anything except the unexpected. So far, John had learned much about his flatmate’s behaviour, including his bouts of boredom, penchant for chemical experiments that should likely be done under a ventilator hood right on the worktop, and ability to produce either achingly beautiful music or something that sounded like a mating cat from his violin. They were becoming friends, John supposed, although Sherlock didn’t _do_ friendship like most people. It was...companionable. Likeable. Easy. And something else, maybe, but John didn’t like to think about that. He’d been lonely, that was all, and if this strange and beautiful man had given him something to look forward to, well, he was grateful. John felt whole again, and that was good, and Sherlock was amazing. Strange, maybe from another planet, but definitely amazing. And for the record, John was fairly sure that Sherlock had never farted in front of him before. 

Greg looked skeptical.

“No, really.”

“You’ve lived with the wanker for three months now. I know he can stink. Jesus, when I found him a few years ago at that crack house he hadn’t showered for…” His sentence was abruptly cut off by a certain someone kicking the back of his seat. “Oi. Stop that.”

John looked back, raised an eyebrow. Sherlock glared back at him.

“I simply control the transport,” said the detective icily.

“Huh. I always knew you were an uptight arsehole,” laughed Lestrade. “But I’m not sure I want to know you’ve _got_ an uptight arsehole.”

Something about “tight arsehole” made Sherlock squirm and, if one was looking very, very closely, there might have been a blush briefly creeping up his neck. But (thankfully) no one was paying attention to him.

“He does eat,” confirmed John, unfazed. “After cases, usually. Loads of takeaway. Not sure what he does with it, though. No...evidence...in the bathroom.”

Sherlock huffed, sighed, muttered, and flopped back in his seat. “Juvenile, John.”

“You should get that checked out,” said Lestrade in Sherlock’s direction. “Not healthy. God only knows what you’ve done to yourself with that abstaining from food crap. Probably have ulcers or something.”

“The average person farts fifteen times a day,” John supplied helpfully. “On average. Some more, some less, depending on diet and genetic disposition. It’s a sign of healthy gut flora. Or lactose intolerance.” He shrugged.

“See?” chimed in Lestrade. “Healthy. The doctor says so. Always listen to your doctor.” Then, “He really doesn’t? Ever?” This was a serious issue. “Why not? I mean, what would cause that?”

“In my professional medical opinion,” said John, “he eats stupidity and shits sarcasm and if he farts at all, it’s in the form of an windy insult.”

Then the doctor and the detective inspector had a good, long laugh at Sherlock’s expense. 

In the back, Sherlock rolled his eyes and pouted, not that anyone was paying attention to him. 

John could be so insipidly dull sometimes. If he had not broken wind in the doctor’s general direction, it was simply because it’s not what you do when you are trying to impress your flatmate, when you are attempting to be alluring and mysterious. A peacock on display does not fart. He struts, he fans his tailfeathers and attracts his mate. John, however, seemed to be oblivious to the peacock’s charms. Likely because he was not a peacock. A bird of prey, perhaps, some type of falcon, maybe. How did falcons attract mates? Likely in the same way. Tailfeathers or talons or something. Perhaps the bird metaphor was unfitting, however, since the female bird only chose the showiest mate for the sake of passing down her genetic material, and John had no use for Sherlock’s genetic material whatsoever, at least as far as reproduction was concerned. Come to think of it, most biological metaphors were completely unsuitable, since most the mating behaviour in males for most species were frankly barbaric in regards to male relations, rams hitting each other on the head again and again in competition, stags ripping each other’s throats open just for a chance at a two minute copulation with a fertile female. Even more confusing was the fact that John and Lestrade seemed to be vying for the loudest and smelliest wind. Was a male’s stench a sign of his success as a mate? Did intelligent men really find this kind of puerile silliness a sign of manliness? Did they wave it around like the peacock’s tail, a telltale sign of a healthy and properly functioning digestive tract? Sherlock’s eyebrows came together in frustration. No, forget the peacock. Did birds even break wind? No. They didn’t. Peacocks most certainly did not sneak out to use the toilet in the bathroom of the currently vacant third floor if they needed to void their bowels while their flatmate was home out of common courtesy and a completely unwarranted but undeniable need to be found...what? Likable? Desirable? Attractive? The entire business was confusing. It was giving him a stomachache. 

It was serendipitous then that Lestrade’s phone rang, and the conversation turned from the obnoxious topic back to a serious one, something about the case. John took notes on a small notepad as Lestrade spoke; traffic began moving (finally). 

In the back seat, Sherlock sat, no longer thinking about the upcoming consult (he had no data to go on yet, anyhow) but trying to discover why John Watson was so fascinating when he was so _plain_ , and why did he have these fluttery stupid _feelings_ about him and what was so amusing about bodily functions anyway and why was John’s arse so perfect even if he did pass gas as he dozed on the sofa? Why was he even looking? Stupid betraying brain!

Traffic slowed back down. Lestrade was still on the phone, John scribbling away, and they were nestled between two lorries on either side whose engines were loud enough combined make Lestrade speak up a bit and put his finger to his ear.

Sentiment. Funny how it produced funny feelings in the transport. Sweaty palms, some kind of aching in the chest, a quick cramp in the gut. Oh, wait. That wasn’t sentiment. Sherlock looked to the left. He looked to the right. He observed John, listening attentively, and Greg, talking to someone and sounding official. Just because he _could_ control the transport didn’t mean he _had_ to. And he was _not_ going to compete for John’s attention with a prematurely gray, frequently-incompetent, twice-divorced, closeted smoker, tooth-whitening, flatulent detective inspector who frequently needed a consulting detective to do his heavy thinking. 

So with all the grace of a prepubescent child, Sherlock Holmes lifted one of those perfect arsecheeks off the seat and farted so spectacularly that he could no longer be ignored. The resounding noise eclipsed that of the idling trucks (fuck the peacock - think bellowing rhinoceros) and by the time a wide-eyed John and a slack-jawed Lestrade turned to look back at him, the smell, which was by far more potent than anything produced by a sausage roll, permeated the vehicle.

“What the buggering fuck?” mouthed Lestrade, still getting an earful from whomever was on the phone, as John covered his nose, gagged, and then broke out into hysterical laughter. 

Sherlock sat back, smirking, pleased with himself. Juvenile and base, yes, but there was always something very satisfying about revenge. And he had made John laugh. Even better, he had outfarted two very masculine men, which he supposed gave him some kind of male prowess. 

“Bloody hell,” exclaimed Lestrade once he hung up the phone. “I guess he’s human after all.”

John wiped tears from his eyes with the heel of his hand before looking back at his friend. Their eyes met. “Mad wanker,” said John, smiling affectionately.

Sherlock smiled, saluted, and winked.


	2. He Masturbates

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Turns out Sherlock really does wank.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I guess I'll have to up the rating.
> 
> Thanks always to Bettyswallocks.

He Masturbates

 

John doesn’t catch him at it. There are no awkward moments, no nervous laughs or pointless denials. Part of him is secretly pleased at finding the evidence. Proof that Sherlock does, once in a great while, at least, sucuumb to basic biology and doesn’t always ignore the needs of his body. That he really is human after all.

John masturbates nearly every other day, which he knows is normal enough (more if he’s had a crap week at the surgery) and definitely a healthier way of relieving stress than drinking. Tonight, though. Tonight was a disaster. He might need a wank _and_ a drink. 

He’d gone to meet someone at the Jazz Cafe, a single mum he’d initially met while treating her daughter for tonsillitis. It didn’t take Sherlock’s powers of observation to see she clearly wasn’t over her ex. She drank too quickly, as if trying to shrug off the past, and then she did shrug her shoulder out of her blouse as she danced. Suddenly John felt entirely too old. He made sure she got home safely and didn’t even feel the slightest urge to come in ‘for coffee’. In fact, her perfume lingered on his shirt and smelled all _wrong_. 

Now he has to go home to Sherlock, who will know immediately that something went wrong, and will, without a doubt, expound on _why_ John failed to secure a sexual partner for the evening. He’ll do it in a clinical fashion, too, as if John were just another silly human being with stupid biological urges that he can not control. 

After nearly five months of living together, John had come to the conclusion that his eccentric, enigmatic flatmate had simply deleted his own libido and would spend the rest of his life completely celibate. Somewhere along the line Sherlock must have decided to take his blogger along for moral support, since the detective had such a knack for ruining John’s dates and sabotaging his attempts at romantic relationships before they even got off the ground. John hadn’t seen Sherlock so much as look at a woman -- or a man, for that matter -- with eyes for anything but deduction. 

Yet Sherlock _knows_ about sex; he can deduce who is sleeping with whom within the first 60 seconds of looking at a person, knows the signs of sex gone sour, secret affairs, deviant behaviour, paraphilia. And Sherlock certainly knows that he had sex appeal and how to use it to get just about anything he wants except for honest companionship. He speaks of emotional entanglements with disdain, sentiment with sarcasm, and sex with disgust.

John knows he could never live like that. He’s known since childhood that he was a physical creature. His body always craved the touch of another, needed physical proximity. He’d traded his mother’s knee for tussling matches with his classmates, and then the rugby lads. He’d sat with his aging grandfather, held his hand. At medical school, his hands found women. John Watson had spent his teens wanting to be taller, but at 20 he realised he was the perfect height to look a woman right in the eye, could lie with her in bed and have everything line up perfectly. Out in Afghanistan there had been a girlfriend for a while: dancing in a club, sleeping curled together, breath between shoulder blades. Intimate. Always touching. Until she was clasping his hand one last time and saying goodbye: it’s not you, it’s me. Turned out the girlfriend had a boyfriend back at home. And then the sniper’s bullet that sent him back to Blighty and months and months of lonely nothing. No wonder he’d been such a wreck. Trust issues, indeed.

Since moving in with Sherlock things are starting to get better. Between the adrenaline and the insanity, he’s made a friend, and while his unusual flatmate isn’t exactly tactile, at least he is another human to live with, and sometimes John manages to get off with someone he likes well enough. ‘Sometimes’ being the appropriate modifier.

When John finally reaches Baker Street and lets himself in, he feels completely knackered, turned inside out and wrung dry, for reasons he can’t quite understand. A shower, then. A shower, a wank, and a good night’s sleep. 

He hears the shower running before he even opens the door. Sherlock’s likely been rummaging through someone’s rubbish again. Sighing, he hangs up his jacket, makes tea, and waits. A few minutes later the water turns off and Sherlock wanders out. John blinks. It’s the first time he’s seen his flatmate in a state of undress, and he’s shocked by what he sees: for as lanky as Sherlock is, his musculature is well-defined, from his arms down to his flat belly. A slight smattering of hair dusts the centre of his chest; John can see it still curled, still damp from the shower. Sherlock’s mop of hair has been towelled off, but his curls are in complete disarray, and a few droplets of water drip from the ends to land on his collarbones before rolling down that expanse of chest and abdomen before being absorbed by the towel that looks barely held together at his groin. His hips frame his navel, under which a trail of dark, tightly curled hair disappears under white terry cloth. John recognized Sherlock was good-looking immediately. The detective was unusually beautiful, in nearly an alien way that made him all the more enigmatic. But now, mother-naked with the exception of his towel, Sherlock revealed himself to be a fine specimen of man. A small part of John is jealous. The other part is appreciative. He isn’t gay, of course, but how could any human not appreciate physical beauty in another when it is so blatantly on display? That is what he tells himself, at least. 

“Oh,” Sherlock says. “Didn’t think you’d be home for another hour at least.” He opens his mouth to begin a let-me-deduce-what-happened speech but John quiets him with a look.

“You done in there?”

“All yours,” he gestures, and turns and pads into his bedroom.

In the bathroom, John pees, strips, and stands under the water for a few moments, letting it wash the day away. The shower head is at the wrong angle -- tilted up for the giraffe he lives with -- so he reaches up blindly and adjusts it. Rolls his shoulders, tips his neck one way, then the other. Soaps himself up, armpits, arse, balls. Rinses, washes his hair. The suds slide down his body. He runs his hands down his torso, over his prick. Nothing’s happening. He sighs. Maybe he’ll have to have that drink after all. He wipes water from his eyes, blinks them back open. He turns and is about to turn off the shower when he sees it.

The colour of the shower tiles is a mineral green, the same shade hospitals were so fond of in the 70s, except the ones in their shower are considerably older. They are in good condition, though, and John keeps their bathroom clean, for fear that his flatmate will culture anything that may grow if he neglects to squirt bleach around now and then. So when he sees a blob of what he initially thinks is shampoo on the tiles between the shower head and the temperature dial, he swipes at his with his hand to wash it away. No sooner does he do so when he realizes that what’s now swirling down the drain is most decidedly _not shampoo_. His own shampoo is blue, and who knows what colour Sherlock’s is... but what was on that tile was without a doubt semen. Sherlock’s, to be exact.

John stares at the tiles, the pattern of water droplets from where his hand swiped still visible. The water is getting in his eyes so he closes them and as he does so he realises that his penis, so disinterested a moment ago, is well on its way to becoming spectacularly hard.

John Watson is not necessarily impulsive. He broods a good deal, thinks things through. But he’s excellent at thinking on his feet when immediate action is necessary and for some reason he’s pretty sure he will never understand his hand shoots out to the ledge where Sherlock keeps his poncy conditioner. One pump in his hand. His hand to his cock. Oh _God_.

Bracing his right hand against the wall, John strokes himself, his hand moving quickly over his himself, down to pull at his balls, back up again. The scent of Sherlock’s conditioner hangs in the humid air, evoking memories of times he’s smelled it before: during stakeouts when they’re sharing tight spaces, or clinging to the Union Jack pillow. Water drips down his nose, into his open mouth. He spreads his legs for stability and arches into his hand. The bath feels warm under his feet, as if he’s standing in the exact same position as Sherlock had a few minutes earlier, for this was undoubtedly what the detective must have been doing, those long, dextrous fingers wrapped around the length of his penis, his right hand, though. Maybe his left had slipped back to tease his hole. Sherlock had actually been pleasuring himself, like all men do once in a while when their bodies _need_ , when they ache, crave the touch of another, someone they trust, feel fondness for, maybe even love. The world’s only consulting detective, mad gorgeous wanker of a flatmate, stood in this shower and _fucked himself_ until he came all over the…

...John’s eyes fly open, blinking away water, as he bends his knees, aims, and paints the tiles with his come in _exactly_ the same spot. He works himself through the aftershocks watching it drip down. Jesus.

A tap at the door.

Startled, he quickly wipes away the evidence.

“Ordering Chinese,” rumbles Sherlock’s voice through the cracked door. “Hungry?”

“Yeah,” he calls, hoping his voice is steady. “Be right out. Thanks.”

Still shaking but feeling much, much better, John turns off the water. There, on the fifth tile over and the fourteenth one down, a bit of his own semen defies his attempt at removal.

He can’t say why he leaves it.


	3. He Cries

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What could move Sherlock to tears?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've got several of Hahn's recordings that I still have from the days when I was part of those CD clubs that sent you music every month for the low, low price of $19.99. I really am not a fan of either Sibelius or Barber (the two Hahn recordings I own) but figured Sherlock would prefer the Sibelius because of the challenge. I would much rather see Tchaikovsky's first violin concerto, but perhaps S.H. would find it too...something. Common? Frilly? IDK. I love it!

HE CRIES

 

Between the business with the Woman and the nightmare in Dartmoor, John and Sherlock take on a case that keep them on their feet for days. John manages to kip here and there, dozing off on the black leather chair in Lestrade’s office or simply falling into the dreamless sleep of the exhausted right there in the St Pancras Library, his head face-down in the files. Sherlock, though. If Sherlock sleeps, John doesn’t catch him at it. He keeps whirling along, hands flapping, mouth running a mile-a-minute, relentlessly pacing, do keep up, John! Sherlock struggles; the answers evade him. He gets angry with himself, launches into tirades, sits for hours, arms covered with patches. As always, he solves it.

When it’s finally over, they are both giddy with post-case adrenaline, Sherlock riding the high of his own genius. The door clicks shut and then both collapse, jackets still fastened, on the sofa. 

The world looks a bit funny at 4am. John knows all about the psychological effects of sleep deprivation, knows that his perception is altered. Sherlock’s not immune to it either, try as he might to redefine the body as transport. 72 hours without sleep would send anyone right round the bend. They’re starving, exhausted, and giggly. And at the moment, nothing seems more amusing than the fact that the detective, the posh tosser, actually smells like hell, that expensive deodorant finally failing. He hasn’t brushed his teeth, there are real bags under those mercurial eyes, and his hair is a wreck. 

“You look like shit,” John muses.

“I knoooow,” Sherlock drawls dramatically. He sounds drunk.

It’s at this moment, as John catalogues Sherlock’s unkempt state, that John realizes that there is something in Sherlock’s hair. He reaches out and tugs. “Hold still,” he mutters, and attempts to extract the offending thing. His clumsy fingers eventually pick out a lolly stick. John holds it up and Sherlock takes it, attempting to analyse it and failing horribly. All that’s left is a sticky green residue that has collected several strands of Sherlock’s hair. 

“Why?” Sherlock says to the offending thing, and for the life of him, John can’t figure out a proper reply. Why indeed? Why are there lollies? Why did someone decide long ago to affix a sugary circle of confectionery to a stick? Is it phallic? What’s wrong with simply popping a boiled sweet into one’s mouth? Is that Sherlock’s lolly? Does he even like lollies? Why green? He likes purple ones, honestly. That fake lime flavouring is horrible. But the blackcurrant. The blackcurrant is good. It tastes like purple. Purple is good. 

John’s stomach growls loudly. Sherlock stares at the stick, must equate it with sustenance, and offers it to John. John shrugs. Accepts it. They sit on the sofa.

Whatever had been holding Sherlock together suddenly breaks, and for no reason, he begins to laugh. He laughs for a solid minute, a little silly giggle that makes John laugh, and then they pause to catch their breaths, look at one another, at the stick, at each other again, and then Sherlock just loses the plot. He laughs so hard he slides off the sofa and onto the floor, where he lies on his back and continues laughing, a completely uncontrollable avalanche of glee sends his diaphragm into spasms and he can’t stop. It’s all very funny, thinks John. Sherlock is funny. Their lives are funny. Hil-fucking-arious. John slides off the couch, too, and they try to catch their breaths.

Eventually the laughs trail off into sniggers and then into something else entirely, something raw, too intense. John lifts his head from where it’s buried in his arms and sees Sherlock gasping. He’s thrown his arm over his eyes and there, running down his cheeks, are tears. 

That sobers John up in a hurry.

“You’re crying,” he announces, concerned.

Sherlock laugh-sobs and wipes at his eyes, sitting up. He takes a few ragged breaths and sobs some more. Tears are now coursing down his cheeks; his nose is running, and he sounds like he’s dying. His body seems caught, no longer differentiating between joy and agony.

“Hey, hey there,” says John. “Breathe in. Through your nose. There you go. In through the nose, out through the mouth. There. There.” John pats Sherlock’s back, smooths his dirty hair from his forehead. 

It takes a minute or two, but eventually Sherlock calms down, wipes at his eyes once more.

“I don’t…” he tries to say. He has no words. The giant supernova of Sherlock’s brain has sputtered out, run out of fuel. A black hole, sucking at...nothing. John knows. He’s been there before.

“It’s okay,” says John, voice quiet, calming. “Stress hormone release. You’re exhausted. It’s all right.”

Sherlock wipes his eyes again (the tears are still leaking out). Looks at the wetness on his hands almost in disbelief. “Perfectly normal stress response,” he manages to mutter. 

John gets him up from the floor, manoeuvres him toward his bedroom. Helps him out of his suit jacket, turns down the covers. Sherlock flips off his shoes and climbs in, still fully dressed. 

John’s nearly out of the door when he hears his friend speak: “Don’t worry. I’m fine.” 

John smiles. “You’re more than fine. Amazing. Now go to sleep, Sherlock.” 

For some reason, John’s not sleepy anymore. He goes back to the sofa. Shucks his jacket, plumps the pillow under his head, and lies down. Something about seeing Sherlock _weep_ like that gets him thinking. 

It’s not like he’s never seen Sherlock cry before. The first time was for the Woman. Not because the emotional debacle she presented; no, Sherlock’s inability to deal with those unprecedented _feelings_ manifested themselves in hours of endless composing, brooding on the sofa with his eyebrows drawn together, staring out the window, and carressing a phone. The only tears he shed for the Woman are the ones that welled up into his eyes on command as he stared into her security camera. They were the real deal, too, John thought as he watched Sherlock put on a performance to make Laurence Olivier jealous. Tear ducts fully functional, then. 

As soon as the buzzer sounded and the lock engaged, the tears were quickly dismissed with, dispatched from his face with a quick swipe of a hand, never to return again. Sherlock strode through that door in Belgravia with the confidence of a crocodile and a smile to match. Later, after the chapter of the Woman was (hopefully) securely closed, John marvelled at just how strange it was. Bloody madman could weep on command but couldn’t muster a single tear for her death or her resurrection.

The only time John actually saw Sherlock genuinely weep was at when they saw Hilary Hahn perform Sibelius’ violin concerto at the Barbican. Tickets had appeared in the post one day around Sherlock’s birthday (Mycroft’s doing, John assumed) and Sherlock seemed genuinely pleased to have them that John couldn’t say no to accompanying him, even if it looked suspiciously like a date. In retrospect, it _was_ a date: Sherlock even ate and had two glasses of Valpolicella with dinner. He had talked incessantly about the soloist throughout dinner, but when Sherlock entered the Barbican Concert Hall, he’d gone quiet and didn’t say a word as they found their seats. He looked perfectly at home among the crowd of well-dressed concert-goers, and he didn’t, for once, seem perturbed by the fact that they were literally surrounded by ordinary people. The conductor of the London Philharmonic entered to applause, followed by the violinist. She looked young; John looked at the programme. He was unfamiliar with the composer or the piece. Had Sherlock ever played it before? John thought to ask him later.

The violinist was extraordinary. Even without any real musical training, John could tell that the piece was intricate and challenging. Sometime during the first movement, John risked a glance at his flatmate, who suspiciously was showing none of his usual signs of being forced to be still: no jittery legs, tapping fingers, gnashing of teeth. In the darkness, Sherlock sat with his eyes closed. He looked like a statue. Asleep, even. Well, if he wanted to sleep through the thing, so be it.

Then, during the third movement, a tiny sniff. And another. Mesmerised by the beautiful young soloist, John barely registered the sound. How on earth was she doing that? Music seemed to emanate from her whole body, not just the instrument, and Sherlock was missing it all. John was ready to elbow him in the side. Daft git. Dragged him out here, so excited, and then...oh. 

In the darkness, surrounded by the unfamiliar yet beautiful music, John saw something he had never seen before: Sherlock Holmes, weeping. Tears were rolling down his cheeks from under his closed eyelids, down the planes of his cheeks and dripping from his chin and onto his suit jacket. His nose was apparently in on it, too. He sniffed again. John, concerned, reached inside his breast pocket for his handkerchief, which he pressed into Sherlock’s palm, his hand lingering perhaps longer than it should. 

John forgot about the violinist. The rest of the concert he marvelled at his friend, his bizarre, complex, brilliant friend, completely losing it over...music. Sherlock was emotionally responsive to music, John knew, but not like this. He wondered whether his flatmate wept when he played in those dark and haunted hours of the morning, if the music quieted the riot of his brain, calmed the raging beast, or if it were more invigorating, like opening a floodgate that Sherlock had trained himself to keep closed: emotion -- repress at all costs. Was it the piece? Was he remembering something from his childhood? A former lover, perhaps? Maybe a music tutor? John hadn’t the foggiest, and he was suddenly sad that he didn’t know, that he wasn’t privy to all of Sherlock’s secrets.

By the time the concerto concluded, Sherlock had managed to pull himself together. He even joined in the standing ovation. 

They took a taxi back to Baker Street. “She was really good,” said John. He tapped the programme against his leg. “Really good.” Then, “You are, too, you know.” 

Sherlock hummed in the affirmative, but said nothing else for the rest of the evening, and when they returned home John left him brooding in front of the fire.

A few days later, John realized Sherlock had never returned the handkerchief, and for some reason, he didn’t feel the need to ask. 

It was still somewhere in Sherlock’s room, John thought, even now, maybe folded and nestled up next to his sock index. It had caught Sherlock’s tears, real ones, not those he conjured forth for the purposes of manipulation. Genuine tears, and John simply couldn’t ask for it back. That square of cotton had been changed, transformed, touched by a god. He was no longer worthy. 

Yet then, no. Not a god. A human after all. A real human being with emotions. 

John hears traffic outside; it’s not light yet, but the night will fade away soon. Sherlock’s laughter still rings inside his head. He’s too tired to go upstairs. He reaches for the blanket, realizes the lolly stick, still covered in green residue, is now stuck to his leg. He pulls it off and holds it in his left hand as his right attempts (and fails) to cover himself. 

It’s all funny, isn’t it? Whatever they are to each other. Funny how similar laughing and crying are. They are either a grand comedy or tragedy, but he’s damned if he can figure out which. And that in itself is amusing. So funny. 

Sherlock finds him the next morning, dead to the world on the sofa, fingers still wrapped around the lolly stick. He gently pries it from John’s warm fingers, tosses it in the bin. 

John’s awakened by the sweet, deep rumble of his laughter.


	4. He Snores

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for the super-speedy beta, DarcyLindbergh.
> 
> My muse has been gone. I'm trying to reconnect.

He Snores

 

 

John honestly didn’t know if Sherlock Holmes was a snorer or not when asked by the owner of the Cross Keys Pub. It wasn’t until nearly ten years later before he could answer with absolute certainty. 

***

The duvet being pulled down, a dip in the bed. John was drifting somewhere between wakefulness and sleep when he felt Sherlock crawl in beside him.

“You OK?” he mumbled, rolling over to face his lover. It was still new to think of Sherlock like that -- his lover -- but it was true nonetheless. It had taken so long, but they’d finally pulled their heads out of their arses and got their act together. Sherlock’s room became _their_ room and Sherlock’s much more comfortable bed became _their_ bed. 

They spent a considerable amount of time in that bed, exploring each other’s bodies and giving each other pleasure, sometimes just holding one another tightly, fingertips tracing patterns over skin. Sherlock would sometimes doze off after sex, curled in on himself or lying face-down, body finally exhausted and brain quiet. Yet he still kept strange hours; he ignored circadian rhythms and John found himself more often than not sleeping nights alone. 

To be honest, it was wiser for him to readjust to co-sleeping slowly. After his divorce John had once again struggled with waking up violently, his body surging with adrenaline, heart pounding in his chest. Moving from his upstairs room to Sherlock’s didn’t quite cure the problem: sometimes he woke up not knowing where he was. Sherlock suggested John not keep his pistol in the bedside drawer. While initially offended, John realised it was sound advice. 

Over the course of a few weeks, however, John’s body accepted Sherlock’s bed as his own, was comforted by the familiar smell of the sheets. He woke less and slept better. Sometimes Sherlock would come and sleep for a few hours and then wake up again, and John was none the wiser.

“I’m actually tired,” Sherlock replied, turning so John could spoon against his back. “You’re warm.”

“Hmmmm.” John hummed against Sherlock’s vertebrae. 

“Go back to sleep.”

 

John tucked his feet between Sherlock’s calves and did exactly that.

***

He would have liked to have said it was a dream, that some horrible buggy-eyed, drooling monster was advancing upon him. Or that he thought there was an animal in the room, some rabid raccoon. Or that it was a nightmare about Afghanistan, that the sound was reminiscent of a 50-calibre machine gun. 

It would have made a better story, at least, he thought sheepishly.

“Jesus Christ. What happened to him?” queried Lestrade as Sherlock studied blood spatters that were nearly indistinguishable from the florid 1970s wallpaper on the kitchen wall of a Hackney flat. 

“Halth ob thith ith chcolate thyrub,” Sherlock said after licking his finger, rubbing it on the wall, and sticking it back in his mouth. No one batted an eye.

“Well…” said John, rocking back on his heels.

“Did he break it?”

“Maybe. I hope not.”

“Got his lip real good, too. Who did he insult this time?”

Sherlock whirled around and stared at the two of them. “Apperantlhy I _thnore_ ,” he said as acidly as he could with his split lip, bitten tongue, and swollen nose. He glared hard at John before turning back to the wallpaper.

“He what?”

John scratched the back of his head. “I may have elbowed him in my sleep.”

“Ah.” Lestrade’s eyebrows cycled through several different expressions as he processed this information.

In his defense, it had been eleven years since he’d slept to the drone of a dozen snoring men, and none of them had been bodily next to him at the time. All John had been aware of was that there was a very loud, sudden, and foreign noise directly to his right, and that he couldn’t really be responsible for what happened when he was suddenly awakened by strange noises, now, could he?

Nevertheless, he still felt awful, and while Sherlock had assured him that he was all right, it didn’t change the fact that John had, with all his might, smashed his elbow directly into Sherlock’s slumbering, slack-jawed face. His nose had erupted like a fountain. John was still tending to it when Sherlock’s mobile rang. Sherlock rode to the crime scene with gauze stuffed up his nose. Before exiting the cab, he’d plucked each one daintily from each nostril and deposited the bloody things into John’s hands. 

“I need to thee the bathroomb,” said Sherlock, who turned, glared at the two of them, and left.

Lestrade leaned in conspiratorially. “Want me to dig up a cold case or two?”

John sighed. “Please.”

***

John apologized again later, first with words, then with lips and tongue.

“Dangerous even in your thleep,” sad Sherlock as they lay face-to-face on a brand-new sheet.

John stroked Sherlock’s split lower lip with his thumb. “I guess so. Does it hurt?”

“Ethquisitely.”

***

So, yes, Sherlock Holmes is a snorer. But only if he is flat on his back. He has since learned to catch himself, rolling himself over upon first snort, subconsciously still wary of John “Wild Elbows” Watson. But sometimes, exhausted after a grueling case or a particularly vigorous shag, he’ll be too far gone to even notice. 

John awakens, just enough to reach out not an elbow, but a hand, and push him over to his side, then snuggles up behind him. 

As they do when waking, Sherlock goes willingly, and John, as always, follows.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Based on a true story. My mother-in-law did the same thing to my father-in-law during their first year of marriage.


	5. He Misinterprets the Data

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to Bettyswallocks for the lightning-quick beta. 
> 
>  
> 
> Again, these are written very quickly. But it's better than not writing at all, right? LOL

He Misinterprets the Data

 

Sherlock chalks the case up as a rousing success. It was a whirlwind of a case, not particularly difficult but there was a time element involved, and he always finds a certain joy in solving a puzzle under pressure. 

In addition, he’d been particularly brilliant in front of Lestrade and his team, and John had said “fantastic!” not once but twice. John had been acting strangely all day, in fact. Staring, more than usual that was, at Sherlock’s mouth. 

In fact, he is still doing it now as they sit in the back of a cab, stuck in the Marylebone Road underpass and going nowhere fast. 

They’d been up all night, and now that the case is closed and they are heading home, the transport is making its demands known. Hunger, while usually the first of his body’s cries for attention, isn’t currently on the top of the list. He’d eaten earlier -- John had handed him something in a Pret a Manger bag (perhaps some kind of a cake?) -- and his stomach wasn’t protesting as it usually did. No, at the moment, he really wasn’t thinking about food. High on post-case adrenaline and buoyed by John’s praise, he allows himself to experience another kind of appetite. Something he’d long ago suppressed: desire. Of the sexual kind, that is.

It’s a delicate thing, trying to navigate a friendship into the murky waters of romantic relationship. Sherlock has never been especially good at the former, and those of the latter sort were few and ended disastrously. There was, too, the question of whether John would be receptive toward Sherlock’s advances. He was, after all, repressing his own bisexuality (and failing, Sherlock thought, reminding himself of the seven times John had licked his own lips today, touched Sherlock’s arm, twice, when he hadn’t needed to, and, for the lack of a better term, “made eyes” at him over the body of an armless corpse). 

It’s dark now, and the lights are reflecting off the rain that’s running in yellow-tinted rivulets down the windows, and Sherlock feels as if they are sheltered, cut off from the rest of the world. John’s body language is hard to read: on the one hand, he’s relaxed, sitting with his legs apart, arm over the back of the seat, his hand close to Sherlock’s head. Something’s troubling him, however. He’s nervous, sending little glances Sherlock’s way, looking as if he’s going to speak and then cutting himself off. 

Sherlock smiles at him. John smiles back. The air is charged.

“Something’s on your mind,” Sherlock begins, because one must begin somewhere. _Please let that something be kissing,_ he thinks. He'd very much like to kiss John. 

John huffs a laugh. “It’s nothing.”

Sherlock gives him a look. John licks his lips. Again.

“It’s just that I’ve been wanting to tell you…”

Really. John can drag things out forever.

“Yes?”

Sherlock leans in. Looks at John’s lips, and then gives his own a good licking, since that seems to be John’s way of communicating intent.

“You’ve got…”

 _Perfectly kissable lips?_ Thinks Sherlock. _I’ve heard that before. No, he’d be more poetic than that. Alliterative? Perfectly peckable pout? Lickable lips? A scrumptious smacker? Whatever words please, you, yes, they are, John. Very sensitive, too. Why don’t you find out?_

Sherlock raises an eyebrow, crooks his lips into what he thinks is a seductive smile, and leans in a bit further. 

“Yes, John?”

“A poppy seed,” John blurts out.

Poppy seed? Sherlock’s mind races. Poppy seed. Poppy seed. Is it a code? Is that what John says when he can no longer control his carnal urges? It is a type of kissing Sherlock is unfamiliar with? His brain reels. Poppy seed, edible, from the poppy flower, papaveraceae, distinctive red flowers, WWI, Flanders, remembrance, sleep, papaver somniferum, banned in Singapore, opium, sweet, sweet morphine, no wait, not that, definitely not that... 

John’s fingers hover around his own mouth for a moment. “You’ve got a poppy seed.”

Sherlock stares at him. A what? Poppy seed. He reaches past his science references. Wasn’t there some Shakespeare play with a Poppyseed? With the fairies? Does he think I have a fairy? Does he think I am a fairy? No, it wasn’t a poppy seed, something else, sunflower or pumpkin or sesame or mustard. Wasn’t there that one movie with the green lady and the fabulous red shiny shoes and some sort of flying primate and a man who controlled everything who was disappointing in person, (a bit like Mycroft)…there were poppies in that, weren’t there? It was deleted long ago. Was there kissing in that film?

John’s mouth parts; his index finger points to his own teeth. “Poppy seed,” he says again. “In your teeth. Between the right centre and the lateral incisor.”

Sherlock blinks twice before it clicks into place. _Poppy seed. It was a poppy seed muffin. From Pret a Manger. You ate it six hours ago. There is a poppy seed caught in your teeth. There has been a poppy seed in your teeth ALL DAY_. 

Oh. 

John wasn’t thinking of kissing him after all. He can feel himself blushing furiously, the skin of his cheeks flaring with heat. It’s an alien feeling, a strange and ugly full-body wash of shame. 

He twists himself away from John to face the window of the cab so he can run his tongue over his teeth without scrutiny. Yes, there, he can feel it. His tongue isn’t enough, and he’s well above picking at his teeth in the back of a cab, so he will have to sit, defeated, for ten more minutes, stupid, stupid, thinking that John wanted to kiss him, wanted to put his mouth so close to one that was harboring the most hateful, offensive, tiny black microscopicly kidney-bean shaped seed known to man…

“Are you embarrassed?” John asks after a beat. “Seriously, you?”

The traffic on Marylebone Road has come to a complete standstill and Sherlock hates everyone.

John laughs. “I’d never have believed it.”

Sherlock, on principle, does not succumb to embarrassment. He learned to quash that feeling years ago, letting ridicule flow over him, through him. But ever since John has entered his life, the emotion has reared its ugly head once more. Sherlock remembers the first time it returned, too, as the drugs squad picked their way through his flat looking for cocaine (he honestly hadn’t had any at the time), an incredulous John looking on, already defending his honour. It took him a full three minutes to identify the sensation: embarrassment, shame, feeling foolish and small. John would be so disappointed. For the first time in nearly two decades, Sherlock realised that he cared very much about what his flatmate through about him. It should have been obvious, but it took a full six months before Sherlock finally identified _why_ he felt shame at a drugs raid but not by a candle placed on a table between them: he had been smitten from the very start.

He tries, unsuccessfully, to dislodge the seed by squeezing saliva between his teeth. It’s a recalcitrant little thing. 

“You know,” says John, “Once we got these new tourniquets, really great devices, and I trained my entire unit with my fly open.”

Sherlock doesn’t move. That’s not so bad. It’s not as if his entire unit were half a foot away from John’s crotch, hoping to kiss it. Or maybe they were. That was worse.

“I wasn’t wearing the standard issue underpants at the time.”

Oh, well, that was intriguing. Sherlock relaxes. It’s fine. The world’s only consulting detective was not going to be deterred by something as insignificant as a poppy seed. Wasn’t he otherwise handsomely attired, properly coiffed, and perfectly groomed? Surely this overall attractiveness would not be disproportionately affected by one tiny wayward seed. 

“Not standard issue?” Sherlock dares to query. It isn’t like John to reveal such personal information. Was he trying to make him feel better? It’s a mystery. Luckily, Sherlock likes mysteries. 

“Nope.” 

John’s smiling. He’s got that smug little pressed-lipped smile he uses when he’s particularly pleased with himself. 

“It’s recommended to always wear tight underwear in hot climates, mind you. Prevents chafing. And sand.” He pauses there. Sherlock’s mouth nearly waters. _John in tight underwear. John in any underwear. John in no underwear whatsoever._

“I’d get parcels from home every once and awhile. Had an ex who thought it would be entertaining to send me a pair of silky boxers. Red, right? For Valentine’s Day. I don’t know what possessed me to put the damn things on that morning, but I did.” He chuckles a bit. “I spent an hour like that before one of those bastards finally told me. I looked like a twat.”

Sherlock shifts away from the window and assumes a more neutral posture. “I wouldn’t have thought that would embarrass you,” he says.

“It didn’t,” John confirms. “But now you’re not sulking any more, are you?”

John smiles at him. It’s warm, and pleasing, and Sherlock smiles back, keeping his lips together. 

He slips dental floss into the inside breast pocket of his coat the following morning. 

John kisses him a week later.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Poppy seeds actually are kidney-shaped. Google it.

**Author's Note:**

> Suggestions are welcome! So far, in the queue, are the following chapters: He Cries, He Masturbates, He Has a Bellybutton, He Snores. Updates will be slow-going, sorry, but they will be in progress! Subscribe for updates, or check out my Tumblr (which is rarely updated but fun anyway).


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